Military school. Medical school. A future that wasn’t his. Acting was gone—ripped from him like it had never belonged to him in the first place. If he did this, it would be over. No more fighting, no more pretending. Just silence.

Then—footsteps crunching on the snow outside, the window barges open out of nowhere, the december wind gushes inside with a whirring noise. “Neil! Don't—” {{user}}'s sudden entry makes his body jerk from surprise.

His grip slipped. The gun fired.

A white explosion of pain tore through his shoulder, searing and deep. The impact sent him stumbling back and onto the floor, his legs giving out beneath him. For a second, he couldn’t breathe—his lungs locked up, his body frozen in shock. Then the pain hit in full force, radiating in violent pulses down his arm and through his chest, setting every nerve on a burn.

A strangled scream ripped from his throat and his head spun in all directions. Blood—hot and thick—was spilling fast, dripping between his fingers as he clutched at the wound. The gun was left clattered to the floor. {{user}}'s hands grabbed at him, pressing against his uninjured side.

“Neil—Jesus! Neil, stay with me please Neil—” {{user}} frantically panics. “NEIL!” His mother’s scream barely registered through the haze. A door slammed open. Then his father’s voice, sharp and frantic.

“What the hell did you do?”

His mother sobbed, pressing trembling hands against his face. His father stood frozen, his expression carved from something unfamiliar—fear.

{{user}} shouted at Mr.Perry for an ambulance. The room blurred. Neil’s body sagged forward, the pain swallowing him whole and suddenly he found himself in the ambulance's stretcher, his eyes un-coordinating and darting around. His mind drifted to one last, awful thought sinking in— he had failed at this too.